Two stories in the wake of a political earthquake: one of betrayal, one of courage

The musical chairs are still turned upside down and scattered around the room in the aftermath of Jason Kander’s announcement this week that he’s running for mayor next year.

The last couple of days, I’ve been talking to people attuned to the warp and weft of city politics, and some compelling story lines are unfolding. Here are two of the best.

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The mayoral candidate who may have been most shocked — and was certainly the most disappointed — at Kander’s announcement was businessman Phil Glynn. Glynn is one of five candidates, including Kander, under 40 years old. Glynn and Kander have been friends for many years, and I’m told they made a pact several years ago that they would never run against each other.

Glynn announced his mayoral candidacy last year while Kander was toying with the idea of running for president. Glynn was so confident his and Kander’s aspirations would not clash that he hired a longtime Kander ally, Abe Rakov, to work on his mayoral campaign. Then, a week ago Monday, Kander called Glynn and said he wanted to meet him for coffee.

That’s when Glynn found out for sure that Kander would be running for mayor. Understandably, Glynn felt betrayed. The meeting ended with Glynn saying, “We’re finished” — or something to that effect. He also fired Rakov and immediately blocked his campaign computer access so Rakov could get no more information about the campaign than he already had — which, of course, was substantial.

Phil and Elizabeth Glynn

Glynn, who co-owns with his wife Elizabeth a firm that finances and supports housing and economic development projects in American Indian communities, left the meeting more determined than ever to pursue the mayor’s office.

The fact is, though, he is — and always was — going to have a difficult time. Some people who have watched city politics for a long time say he is simply reaching too high too soon; that he should have run for the 4th District City Council seat and served at least one four-year term before indulging in his bigger political ambitions.

In addition, he has deep roots in Visitation Catholic Church and even has political competition there. Another mayoral candidate, Steve Miller, a lawyer who is former chairman of the Missouri Highway and Transportation Commission, has equally deep roots in Visitation. The two will not only be tapping some of the same potential campaign donors, they will be splitting much of the Catholic vote.

…I’ve known Phil since he was a youngster, and he’s a solid, substantive, smart person. I’d like to see him become mayor some day, but I fear the experienced observers are right: He’s going after the biggest political job in Kansas City with very little name identify and without having started out on a lower political rung.

(In the interests of disclosure, I’ve contributed $500 to Phil’s campaign. I said it was $250 in my last post but went back and found out that was wrong.)

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Down ballot, Kander’s 7.0-Richter-scale quake is sending tremors into some City Council races, particularly the 4th District race.

The 4th District incumbent is Jolie Justus, who had announced she was running for mayor and may have had Mayor Sly James’ support, at least his quiet support.

May have, that is, until Kander came along…and now Sly is reportedly backing him.

Justus was so freaked she immediately jumped out of the mayor’s race and announced, instead, she would seek re-election to the 4th District seat. (Katheryn Shields is the 4th District at-large council member, and she should have no problem getting re-elected.)

At least three candidates had already announced their intention to run for the 4th District seat, however, on the presumption it would be an open seat, with Justus running for mayor.

The field included Jared Campbell, Matt Staub and Geoff Jolley.

With the shell game going at full speed, Campbell and Staub quickly bowed out. But not Jolley, a 41-year-old Kansas City fire fighter who also is a lawyer, has a consulting company and, until April, worked for U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver.

Geoff Jolley

Just as Phil Glynn refused to stand down, Jolley determined he, too, was going to stay in the race. That, in itself, took guts, but Jolley went further, publicly taking a shot at Justus for turning tail and seeking safe haven in the councilmanic seat.

“Running for any office is about serving the community, not about having a seat until something else comes along,” Jolley said in a statement.

…I met Jolley, a Northeast Kansas City resident, at a fund-raiser Wednesday evening for Katheryn Shields. He’s very impressive — relaxed and straightforward — and projects a quiet confidence. Some insiders now think he has a good shot at beating Justus. Some of the same people say that as she turned her attention to the mayor’s race, she lost touch with her district and her constituents there.

Perhaps some of you saw the comment of reader Vern Barnet, a minister and founder of the Kansas city Interfaith Council, on my last post. Barnet said:

“Jolie Justus has been a disgrace, faithless to her constituents…repeatedly failing to answer even friendly constituent mail, and dragging her feet on the Westport merchants’ sidewalk vacation proposal. Her shaky ‘leadership’ on the airport mess (working outside normal protocol for a project that should have been widely bid at the start) indicates ambition but little dedication to the citizens of Kansas City and more to where the big bucks are.”

Ouch!

If Vern’s opinion is widespread, Justus could be in big trouble.

…Hang on, everybody, it’s going to be a crazy-fun, wild ride to the April and June city elections.

I wondered if anyone would comment on that word usage, John, and leave it to an old St. X buddy to point it out…I first heard the term in the late 1970s, I believe, when I was interviewing Patricia McIlrath, founder of the Missouri Repertory Theatre, now the Kansas City Repertory Theatre, for a feature story in The Star.

Dr. Mac, as she was known, was brilliant and laser-focused, and I remember her eyes burning with intensity as she spoke about the theater in general and about needing to improve the show that was running at the time. (It had received some bad reviews.) I don’t remember the context, but she used the term “warp and woof” (a variation of warp and weft) at least twice in that conversation. I didn’t want to look stupid by asking her what it meant — I understood the context, anyway — but as soon as I got back to the office I looked it up and was thrilled to have been introduced to such an expressive term. I haven’t used it in years — maybe never in the blog — but it worked today…Thanks for noticing!

I’m impressed with Austin Strassle, running for 4th District Councilman At-Large. I told him he was running against the wrong person, Katheryn Shields, who may be the best qualified person to be mayor — intelligent, dedicated, responsive, a depth of unparalleled government background. But she’s not running for Mayor and instead has my vote to continue on the Council. Austin is a Housing Stabilization specialist for Truman Medical Center — and Jolie Justus serves as a member of the Midtown Housing Advisory Board and the Truman Medical Center Board of Directors, which may explain why Austin is not running against Jolie, who deserves, as I’ve said, defeat. So I’m glad to learn about Jolley, who may have picked the right race and the right time. Thanks!

I much prefer that Jason Kander run for governor in 2020 rather than seek the mayoral seat here in KC. It looks like there are a number of qualified candidates already in the mayoral race. The people of KC _ as well as the state_ would be much better served with Kander back in Jefferson City.

I agree Missourians would be well served by Kander, Mike, but I think he doesn’t want to go up against the statewide, big red wave again — even though I’d like to think he could make a strong run against Mike Parson…As a friend I spoke with at Katheryn’s event said, Kander is going for “the low-hanging fruit.”

I realize I am tilting at windmills, but it sure would be nice to begin to get some idea of where Kander stands on the issues. He can even start with a relatively easy one, “relatively easy” in the sense that (as issues in KC go) the question has a pretty narrow scope.

Specifically, which of the three proposed options does he favor for naming after MLK Jr.? Or, does he have a different preference? His answer would begin to give us a feel as to how directly he will answer a question, as well as the extent to which he will try to avoid alienating any political and civic factions.

In one of the dumber exaggerations of that policy some poor schmuck who played in a band got in trouble because he played at the birthday party (?) for some local politico. And yet, Kraske and Shelly and some of the others participated in the “forums” run by the Mainstream Coalition, a very hard left organization in JOCO.

I remember your account of the guy who played at the birthday party…Love your description of him as “some poor schmuck.”

…And, Peg, about the spouses…More than once in my last few years at The Star I was able to “convince” my wife Patty to contribute to certain candidates…If there was ever a ban on spouses contributing, I never heard about it. I don’t think there was; that would be very difficult to justify and enforce.